I am new to this sight but have found it helpful. There are many logo's but I am not good with formatting.

the name of my landscape company is Plymouth River Landscape. I am looking to create a logo that looks professional, but not have to pay. I know Apple has great programs for such things, but I have windows. what program do you use to format logos?
any help?

JeffK26

11-22-2011, 06:27 PM

I used coreldraw5, they offer a 30 day free trial, get what you want done with it because it's a few hundred bucks if you want to buy it after the trial. They also have a lot of good tutorials online.

My logo is pretty basic and could probably have done it on a free program but i got a lot of use out of it creating flyers and different versions of my logo to fit on Christmas cards, New Years and other Holidays....i had a blast learning it.

A sample of your Plymouth River Landscape logo used Adobe Illustrator.

David C. Lopez
http://www.dclgraphics.com

Steve

11-24-2011, 09:07 AM

David, that is a very nice design!

Also, something to consider when it comes to software, there is a free graphics program called gimp http://www.gimp.org/ that you might want to experiment with.

PlymouthRiverLandscaping

11-24-2011, 09:45 AM

I liked that logo David. Is there any way to make the bright green in Plymouth River Landscaping a little darker?

I am going to try to familiar myself with that gimp website!

Gracias

dclgraphics

11-24-2011, 12:09 PM

Logo with a darker green.

In what format do you need the logo in?

Happy Thanksgiving

Steve

11-26-2011, 02:11 PM

David,

When a business owner is designing a logo, are there any elements they should include or try to stay away from?

What about colors? Are there some colors that are better for logos than others?

dclgraphics

11-26-2011, 10:44 PM

Your logo design should be simple.
One of the basic rules of creating logos is the fact that it has to look well in a black and white format. At some time in your companies life you will need a b+w or two color version of your logo. Your logo can appear on a variety of media: signage, advertising, stationery, or on vehicles.

One thing you need to be careful of as you explore color options is cost.
Your five-color logo may be gorgeous, but once it comes time to produce it on t-shirts or NCR invoices the price won't be so attractive, Nor will it work in mediums that only allow one or two colors. look at your logo in b+w, two and four color versions.

See sample pdf file.

David C. Lopez

Steve

11-28-2011, 09:15 AM

What about using shadows and gradients in a logo design? Is that good or bad? I can imagine it would make it tougher to replicate in certain medians.

dclgraphics

11-29-2011, 09:19 PM

Gradients and drop-shadows are not out of the question but quality will be not appear as good as the original, a logo should be designed for spot color printing. Think of the future and consider that many businesses start up companies needing stationery and printed advertising it will be easier and less expensive to print on merchandise (T-shirts, mugs, vinyl signs etc)

With a logo design using spot colors, reproduction will be consistent and therefore more distinctive. So ask yourself - 'will that fancy gradient effect cost me more in the long-run?